Fig. 2

Histograms showing differences between unaffected and cancerous pieces in the levels of the distinct AChE mRNA variants and the single BChE transcript. mRNA of adjacent non cancerous tissues (ANCT; blue bars) and of head and neck squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCC; red bars). mRNA was extracted, retro-transcribed and amplified using the primers indicated in Additional file 1: Table S1. β-actin and GAPDH mRNAs were used as the housekeeping markers. AChE-T, AChE-H, and AChE-R stand for tailed (synaptic) AChE, hydrophobic (erythrocytic) AChE, and read-through AChE. AChE and BChE mRNA levels in HNSCC and ANCT pieces (a) and in tissues from smoker and non smoker patients (b). Note the lower AChE-T mRNA level (p = 0.036) and higher BChE mRNA level (p = 0.015) in HNSCC than ANCT pieces (a) and the significant decrease of both AChE-T and AChE-H mRNA levels in ANCT (dark blue) and HNSCC (dark red) tissues from smoker patients. (* p < 0.05)